by Lane Hart
“Drake, I can’t…I don’t have time…”
That’s the last word I get out before Drake’s fangs sink into my inner thigh; his mouth so close to my pussy that his nose rubs my clit as he drinks from me. I no longer feel his sharp fangs, just his tongue and lips slurping the blood from my body. And suddenly, the exhaustion from being awake for nearly two days hits and the utility room goes dark.
Drake
Fuck me sideways! Harper’s blood was delicious before but now…it’s exquisite, the most amazing thing I’ve ever tasted, and I can’t get enough.
I know I need to stop soon, and I will, after a few more drops.
A few more drops come and go and still I’m unable to pull my mouth away.
Only when Harper’s legs go weak and she collapses to the ground do I finally stop drinking from her.
“Harper?” I say, noticing for the first time that she’s no longer lighting up the dark space like a glowworm. Nor is she talking. “Harper!” I say again as I crawl up her body and find her head resting on a dustpan. Her eyes are closed, lips parted but I don’t hear her breathing.
“Oh fuck!” I shout as I put my fingers to the side of her throat searching for her pulse. It’s there but so, so weak. I drank too much from her and nearly killed her!
I have no clue what to do. I’ve never taken too much from anyone before. My first thought is to give her some of my blood. Biting into my wrist hard enough to break the skin, I then hold it to her lips and squeeze with my other hand to try and get a few drops into her mouth.
When nothing happens, I scoop her up into my arms and burst out of the utility room.
“Someone get the doctor!” I scream. “Call the fucking doctor, right now!” I shout, knowing that there should be somebody around working nearby in the kitchen. When I don’t hear anyone moving, I carry Harper out the door to the front where there are always shifters patrolling. I see two dark shadows and yell at them, “Get the doctor down here now!”
It takes a few seconds before my words sink in and one of them finally starts speaking into his radio.
I lay Harper down on the ground and check to see if she’s breathing again. Not sure what else to do, I place my mouth to hers and blow air into her lungs until the front door bursts open.
“Is that…what the hell did you do to my witch?” Voss shouts as the man with him, hopefully a guy with medical training kneels down on the other side of Harper and starts working on her, resuming the breathing in her mouth followed by chest compressions.
“Are you a vampire?” the doctor asks me while he keeps up the CPR.
“Y-yeah, yes.”
“You tried to give her your blood?” There are still some red drops on her lips.
“I didn’t know what the fuck else to do!” I exclaim.
“That’s good. It’s the best we can do for now. Give her more. If she doesn’t swallow enough, we may need to draw a pint of yours and give it to her in an IV.”
“Is his blood safe?” Voss asks as he hovers over us.
“Witches can’t be turned. We can give her as much as it takes to bring her back,” the doctor tells him.
“Bring her back? You mean I-I killed her?”
Voss jerks me up by the front of my shirt and yells in my face. “If she doesn’t make it, I will make you suffer! And if she lives, you will never drink a drop of her blood again!”
“I didn’t mean to hurt her! If I don’t drink from her, I’ll die. And she tasted so good, different, and I couldn’t stop! I didn’t even realize she had stopped glowing until it was too late!”
“Glowing?” Voss says. “She came into her magic?”
“I don’t fucking know, but her skin was lighting up the room and her blood was even sweeter…”
“Praise Satan, she came into her magic! He did it. Kingston took her innocence and could’ve impregnated her if not for you ruining everything!”
“Doubtful since your kid used a condom,” I point out.
“Do I have to do everything myself?” he roars. “Take her to the medical wing,” he says to the doctor as he grasps my elbow. “We’ll bring him along and drain him for every drop of his blood if that’s what it takes!”
“I’m sorry, okay! The first time I didn’t know her blood was addictive or that I wouldn’t be able to stop. Now I can’t live without it.”
“How is that my problem?” Voss asks as the doctor cradles Harper in his arms and he pulls me through the front with him. I could easily break out of his grip, but I would give all of my blood if it means helping Harper. “You never should have tasted her blood. You’re lucky I’m not sending you to the guillotine. In the future, though, you best remember that she doesn’t belong to you and she never will!”
“She doesn’t belong to you either,” I point out.
It sounds like he then mutters, “That doesn’t mean she can’t give me a few powerful witches and warlocks of my own.”
Chapter 19
Rowan
Harper didn’t show up to meet me tonight. I waited for an hour before coming to the house looking for her. I know her and she wouldn’t blow me off, especially when it would’ve been so easy to sneak out during the power outage.
The only other explanation for her not showing is that she saw the shifters in animal form again last night and decided that we’re too different, that she doesn’t want to be with someone like me.
I was about to give up and go back out on patrol when I ran into one of the kid warlocks and asked if he had seen Harper.
“Not since the day before yesterday. I don’t think she slept in her bed either, because it was still made.”
The fact that she hasn’t been to her room or to meet me is worrisome.
And even though I know it’s stupid, I need to find out where she is. So that’s why I decide to go and get answers from the one man I’m guessing would know.
Unfortunately, Voss isn’t in his office.
I even sit down in his chair and wait on the asshole for half an hour.
Just as I’m about to get up and leave, another figure comes through the door. At first, I think it’s Voss, but thanks to the light red glow he’s emitting I know it’s Kingston.
“You’ve gone too far this time, father! Have you lost your mind?” Kingston bellows.
“Thank fuck I’m not your father,” I reply. “And what did you do, shove a flashlight up your ass?”
“Who’s there?” the warlock asks, coming to a stop several feet away from his father’s desk.
“I’m just waiting for your father.”
“I said who is there?” Kingston grits out as he comes closer to the desk. His eyes squint as he looks me over and then widen as if in recognition. “You!” he exclaims. “What are you doing here, Rowan?”
I’m surprised the jerk actually knows my name since I’m just a lowly shifter. “Not that it’s any of your fucking business, but I’m looking for Harper.”
“She’s fine,” he says right away. “Better than fine.”
“How the hell would you know that?” I ask when I get to my feet to go around and face off with him.
“Because I’ve been alone with her for the past forty-eight hours.”
“What the fuck for?” I ask through clenched teeth, my fists balling up by my sides with the urge to punch the asshole in his cocky face.
“We were locked in a cell in the dungeon together and escaped after the power went out,” he explains. “It wasn’t my idea or fault. That’s why I came to speak to my father.”
“He put you down there?” I ask in disbelief.
“Yes.”
“I’ll fucking kill him!” I shout.
“I would be satisfied with his resignation, but wouldn’t shed a tear for his death,” Kingston says.
“And how exactly do you plan to overthrow him?”
“Because, shifter, I’m the most powerful warlock alive, all thanks to Harper,” he says while lifting his arm to examine the glow.
�
��What does she have to do with anything?” I ask in confusion.
“That’s probably something you should discuss with her,” he replies with a grin. “She may care for you, but apparently not enough to stop her from giving her virginity to me.”
My hand is wrapped around his throat a second later, squeezing. “If you touched her, I’ll rip your insides out through your throat!”
His own hand covers mine and then, somehow, makes my flesh burn and even sizzle like I’ve laid it on a stove. “What the hell?” I shout as I let go of him and rub the seared skin on the back of my hand.
“Now that Harper’s come into her power and knows how good it feels to be with her own kind, you won’t be able to keep her away from me.”
Burnt hand or not, I’m about to haul back and smash my fist into his face when my radio crackles. A frantic voice comes over the line asking for the doctor’s assistance at the front of the house. There’s a lot of static, so it’s hard to tell, but I could almost swear he said something about a vampire and…a witch.
“What did he just say?” Kingston asks, but I’m already running toward the door.
“You and I will have to finish this later,” I tell him over my shoulder. “Right now there’s a vampire I need to murder!”
“That stupid son of a bitch,” I hear Kingston mutter as he catches up behind me. I take the stairs two at a time down all three flights; but by the time we reach the front steps, it’s empty other than two guards.
“Where are they? Where did they take her?” I ask them in a rush.
“Medical I think Voss said,” one of the shifters responds.
“Medical? Where’s that?” I ask Kingston.
“Back to the dungeon,” he grumbles before he starts in that direction with me on his heels.
Kingston
Just as Rowan and I reach the bottom of the spiral stairs, we run into the vampire, and I mean that literally. The tall, lanky asshole crashes into me in the darkness, the only light coming from the flashlight in Rowan’s hand coming up behind me. If I can now burn people with the heat from my powers, then this jackass could freeze them to death. Bodies in morgues have probably felt warmer.
“What the fuck were you thinking?” I scream at him, pinning him to the wall with two fists full of his shirt.
“I never meant…I-I didn’t mean to,” he stammers.
“If she doesn’t recover, you won’t either,” I threaten him.
“She’s fine. Harper came to after they…they drained me,” Drake says as he starts sliding down the wall. My hands on him are all that’s keeping him up right. “Need to feed.”
I had no time to prepare for his strike. One second, I’m the aggressor, and the next…fangs are sinking into the inside of my forearm, locked so tight that if I try to pull away, I may lose a big chunk of the limb.
Grabbing Drake’s hair, I try to pull his mouth off of me, and that only makes him groan and slurp even harder.
“You’re dead, vamp,” I warn him, but he’s currently too blissed out to care. “Some help here?” I say over my shoulder to Rowan, who is shining his light on the whole scene and refusing to intervene.
“Your problem, not mine,” he huffs. “I just want to find Harper. Can’t you burn him off so we can keep moving?”
I try to push my power from the part of my body he’s feeding on, just like I did to force Rowan to let my throat go earlier, and…nothing happens. He’s not just taking my blood, but my skin is losing its luminescence. He’s draining my strength!
“Get off of me!” I yell as I nearly rip his hair out of his skull.
Finally he relents, lifting his face and licking his lips. “Delicious, but Harper tastes better.”
“If you ever drink from me or her again, I’ll string you up by your feet and drain every drop of blood from your body!”
“You could try, but I’m helluva lot stronger than you now that I’m no longer running on empty.”
“Could you two both shut the hell up so we can find Harper?” Rowan snaps from behind us as he shoves my back to get by me in the narrow corridor, pushing me right into the front of the vampire’s body. He’s almost my height but lean and scrawny, as thin as a pancake…except for the hard, thick inches where our groins are currently pressed together. And maybe it’s more than the power surge that led me to screw around with warlocks, because I enjoy the sensation of his erection poking me a little more than I should.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” Drake says when he pushes my chest to put some room between us. “Mine’s from the blood lust. What’s your excuse?”
Refusing to respond to that accusation at the moment because there are more important things to worry about, I reach down to subtly adjust my swollen cock and tell him, “Just show us where to find Harper.”
“I can try,” he replies, taking lead. “But your dear old dad locked the room down after he threw me out and I couldn’t get back in.”
We hurry past the cell Harper and I burst out of earlier with Rowan stopping to sniff the air with a curse.
Finally, we reach the door Drake assures us is where my father and the doctor are still locked up with Harper.
Rowan slams his shoulder into the concrete, and of course it doesn’t budge. “If she’s better, then why are they still in there with her?” he asks us as he rams into the door over and over again.
“No clue, and now that the dickhead sucked out all of my power, I can’t open it either,” I add after placing my palms to the surface and nothing happening, not even a flick of magic. Instead, I try putting my ear to it, trying to hear what’s happening on the other side.
“Pretty sure there’s something else you wish I would suck,” Drake mutters.
“Shut the fuck up,” I tell him while I strain to hear, but the voices are all muffled. I slam the side of my fist against the door a few times. “Harper? Are you okay?”
“No!” she screams clearly. “Get me out of here!”
I’m pretty sure my heart comes to a complete stop in my chest, hearing the anguish in her voice.
“We’ve got to get to her!” Rowan exclaims, and yet I have no clue how the hell we’re gonna do that.
“Harper, use your magic!” I yell.
“Ah, if you mean what was making her glow, well, I sort of snuffed her light out too when I drank from her,” Drake informs us. “Sorry.”
“Oh, you’re going to be sorry, all right,” I grit out before my fist swings at his face. Thanks to his stupid vampire speed, he dodges it.
“Hey, you should be thanking me for bringing her here!” Drake responds. “If I had actually taken her home like I said I would, you’d still be banging warlocks!”
“That’s right, it’s all your fault Harper is here in the first place!” Rowan roars at him. And his voice actually sounds more animalistic than human.
“Yeah, and you should be thanking me too,” the vampire shouts back. “You’re just pissed that you weren’t enough for her.”
“At least she was with me by choice and not out of pity because you would die without her blood!” the shifter argues. And then his temper apparently takes him over; because one second he’s standing, fuming, and the next he drops his flashlight and is on all fours, the sounds of his body twisting and his agonized groans echoing in the dark corridor.
Now, not only are we still fucked, but all I have to help me get to Harper is an annoying vampire and a pissed off tiger.
Chapter 20
Harper
One second, I was in the closet with Drake and the next I was gasping awake from the deepest sleep I’ve ever had.
“We got her back,” a man’s voice announces.
“Good,” another replies, this voice sounding like Voss’s. “Strap her down while I get rid of the vampire.”
“No! Wait! Harper, Harper I’m so sorry!” Drake’s voice carries from across the room. “I didn’t mean to…” I catch sight of him being dragged by Voss across the floor; and then once he clears the door, i
t’s slammed shut.
“Wh-what happened?” I ask as I try to figure out where I am and what’s going on. The doctor I met on the first night is fastening a cuff around my right wrist and there’s an IV coming out of my arm that’s connected to a red bag, the crimson liquid being pumped into my vein. Blood?
I feel stronger with every pump of my heart, the fog clearing enough until I realize I’m in another room in the cool, damp basement dungeon. I’m lying on a raised bed, maybe a hospital bed with both of my arms secured by cuffs at my sides. I try to make my hands into fists, but they still seem numb, and all I manage to do is make my fingers twitch.
My trapped wrists become the least of my concerns when the doctor lifts my right foot into a metal rung with my knee up before moving to the other. When he’s done, my legs are spread in an awkward embarrassing position.
“What are you doing?” I ask. The doctor only gives me the briefest glance before he picks up a large pair of scissors and I hear snip, snip, snip near my lower body. I’m still wearing my skirt and can’t see or feel past it yet, but I think he just cut up my panties! “What is going on?” I ask again, looking between him and Voss, who approaches from the foot of the bed, his gaze on the part of my body that is now on display.
“We’ve wasted too much time. I gave my son weeks to impregnant you, but now I’ve growing impatient. If he won’t do it, then I will.”
Oh hell no! I think to myself as I try to lift my wrists and press my knees together as much as I can in the restraints.
“This is what we should’ve done that first night,” Voss says as he removes his suit jacket, tossing it on a counter full of medical supply before rolling up the sleeves of his dress shirt.
“Let me go!” I yell. “You can’t do this to me!”
“We’ll put you to sleep and you won’t feel a thing,” Voss tells me when he comes over and brushes a strand of hair back from my face.
